Page 67 of Valentine's Slave

“What does that mean?” Malcolm asks, while Hailey comes over and grabs my bags. She catches sight of my teary eyes, and concern fills her gaze.

“It means he’s afraid of commitment and intimacy,” I say. I hope Malcolm’s never like Valentino. I hope he’s a real man who stands up for what he wants and needs and goes after it, even if it scares him.

“Leave your Auntie alone, Malcolm,” Hailey says gently. “She needs some space.”

“That was jerkish of him,” Malcolm muses as he heads towards his room. “I thought that adults were smarter than kids.”

I roll my eyes. Not by a long shot.

I sit down at the kitchen table a blubbering mess. I didn’t realize I was feeling things this deeply. And yet, it was also infuriating.Hewas infuriating. But now—now I don’t know what to do without him.

Hailey has seen my tears many a time before, and she’s often offered her revenge services, free of charge. She keyed Craig’s car after he dumped me for a freshman in high school back in my junior year.

“Do I need to hire an assassin?” she asks, eying me warily.

I chuckle, not because it’s funny but because I’m feeling so desperate.

“No. I think I love him. I mean, I know I don’t, but I’m heavily under the influence of emotion.”

“Ava, sweetheart, he sounds like a professional fuckboy. They have ways of messing with the female mind.”

“But he wasn’t trying,” I say. “Well, he was, but it seemed like he was being more himself as the week went on, not less. He kissed me and took me out in public even though that went against his rules. He told me he cared. He . . . he . . .” My voice breaks.

“Okay, take a breath,” Hailey says, setting a cup of tea in front of me and wrapping her arm around my shoulders. “Why don’t you take some time, and then you can tell me what happened? Like these rules. What was this guy doing, living out a roleplay?”

“He has a yearly ritual to fuck someone, or multiple people, during the week that his family was murdered,” I say.

Hailey’s mouth drops open, and I laugh.

“I know,” I say. “It’s crazy.”

I get some food into my system, and after taking a nap, I sit down with Hailey for three hours and tell her everything.

“Sounds extravagant, to say the least,” she says. “But the guy had problems—at the very least, a fear of intimacy, and God knows what else.”

“Yes, but he was honest. I thought he was opening up to me.”

“He could have been. Carried away in the moment. Was he drunk?”

“He doesn’t drink.”

“Oh right, after his druggie days,” she says. “At any point did you tell him that you wanted more?”

“Obviously not. He paid me to be his personal sex slave. Talking about love wasn’t exactly part of the agreement.”

“First of all, we don’t necessarily know if it’s love,” Hailey says. “I don’t mean to make it less than it was, but it’s only been aweek, a week full of intensity and crazy sex. That can cause some pretty heavy mental and emotional confusion.”

“Yeah, I know he was a jerk,” I say. “But I swear he had another side. He took care of me.”

“I’m not saying he didn’t care about you." Hailey looks at me with concern in her blue eyes. "But even if he did care, it seems that that wasn’t enough. Men are highly logical. They can often step over their feelings much easier than women can. There are exceptions, obviously, but as a general rule, they’re much more ruled by logic and reason.”

“So, on the assumption that I was right, and hedidfeel something, what logical reason would make him want to end things?” I feel desperate, lost.

Hailey shrugs. “It was the contracted deal. Breaking the original agreement and asking you for a further emotional connection would be violating the logic and reason of the contract for the sake of emotion. From what you’ve described, despite having passionate feelings, he doesn’t sound like a largely emotional person.”

“He’s a fucking asshole, that’s what he is.”

“Totally,” she agrees. “Drinks on the house tonight?”

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